Li Wei

(born in 1970, Hubei, China) is a contemporary artist from Beijing, China.

His work often depicts him in apparently gravity-defying situations.Wei started off his performance series, Mirroring, and later on took off attention with his Falls series which shows the artist with his head and chest embedded into the ground. His work is a mixture of performance art and photography that creates illusions of a sometimes dangerous reality. Li Wei states that these images are not computer montages and works with the help of props such as mirror, metal wires, scaffolding and acrobatics.

"My work and artistic experience are characterised by a unique specificity and particularity," 

"My artistic language is universal and deals with themes about contemporary politics and society using symbols understood by everyone in every part of the world."

"I am fascinated by the unstable and dangerous sides of art and I hope my works reflect these aspects."

"My favourite pieces are the 'Mirror' and the 'Li Wei falls...' series," 

"I began my career in the late 1990s, and is most like my Mirror 2000 series, which includes over 40 site-specific performance pieces."

"Using a large mirror, three feet square, with a hole in the centre large enough to accommodate my head and neck, I place my head through the hole and "project" my image onto various historical and urban environments."

"The philosophy that emerges from my work shows the independence of the spiritual values of Chinese artists and the internal peace of a culture."

"The first reaction is astonishment. Some people think they are full of sense of humour. They are curious about how I did this."

"Sometimes I am in real danger - I have to hang myself high with steel wires and people do get a little worried for me - but I am fine."

Li Wei sees his art as both a mission to set the scene for the perfect photograph and a perfect performance."

"Each photograph lies with a performance"

"For me, how to express myself and the process is more important. I don't care much about if that's performance or photography."

"I'll continue creating works in high places."

"I incorporated gravity as one of my main elements."

"In these, my body crashes like a meteorite in different contexts."

Julia Agafonova

Julia Agafonova is only 21 years old, a young talented Russian photographer.

her blog + Flickr

Don't we all love a little bit quirkiness, a little bit eeriness ?

Liu Bolin

(born 1973 in Shandong, China)

is a Chinese artist known for taking photographs of himself, 

painted in order to blend in with the background.

He graduated from the Sculpture Department of Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing.

These series is called "Hiding In The City".

Liu said he wanted to show how city surrounding affected people living in them.

He added that the inspiration behind his work was a sense of not fitting in to modern society and was a silent protest against the persecution of artists.

He said: 'Some people call me the invisible man, but for me it's what is not seen in a picture which is really what tells the story.

'After graduating from school I couldn't find suitable work and I felt there was no place for me in society.

'I experienced the dark side of society, without social relations, and had a feeling that no one cared about me, I felt myself unnecessary in this world.

'From that time, my attitude turned from dependence into revolting against the system.'  

Liu said he was further pushed on with his work when the Chinese authorities shut down his art studio in Beijing in 2005.

He said: 'At that time, contemporary art was in quick development in Beijing, but the government decided it did not want artists like us to gather and live together.

'Also many exhibitions were forced to close.

'The situation for artists in China is very difficult and the forced removal of the artist's studio is in fact my direct inspiration of this series of photographs, Hiding In The City.'  

Liu's art credentials were formed after he graduated from the prestigious Sculpture Department of Central Academy of Fine Arts in China.

He said his work requires a lot of patience with him having to pose and work on his photographs for more than ten hours at a time to get it just right.

'My job is to choose a good background where I want to be "disappeared", and then stand there unmoved until a design has been painted on me,' he said.

'There are many people who like my work I think because my work has a quiet strength, in the photographs.

'I am standing, but there is a silent protest, the protest against the environment for the survival, the protest against the state.

'I wanted to photograph the reality of scenes of China's development today.

'My work is a kind of reminder, to remind people what the community we live in really looks like, and what kind of problems exist.' 

Olivier Theyskens

(born January 4, 1977 in Brussels, Belgium) is a fashion designer who has worked with several major houses, including Rochas, Nina Ricci and Theory. 

It was so nice that I have a chance to meet Olivier in Lane Crawford yesterday. He is such a lovely person. He is one of the talents whom I really admire in the fashion industry. We both love him so much.  He currently becomes the artistic director of the brand "Theory". Here is a video I would like to share with you. Let's take a look at Olivier Theyskens and see how he defines himself as a designer and also as a person.

Love Olivier Theyskens, love his personality, love his passion, love his design, love everything of him.

"Define us, but you can't. We can be anything."
This is not only for us  , but also for Olivier Theyskens.

Define us SIX

DefineUs 100, 2 of Us

Zhe Chen

Zhe Chen, from Beijing, China

is a LA-based artist/photographer

who studied Photography & Imaging in Art Center College of Design, CA

The photo series The Bearable (2010) is one of the documentaries of self-inflicted activities of Zhe and others focusing on body modification, human hair, identity confusion, post-traumatic stress disorder and memory in the past 4 years.